Watching the sea of Mexican flags fill the plaza this past
October and listening to the staccato burst of Spanish slogans
shouted out by flushed, excited faces, a casual observer might
have thought he was in one of those revolutionary provinces near
Chiapas commanded by modern Zapatistas. Indeed, many of the slogans
were anti-Yankee, and every now and then the sea of Mexican flags
would part to reveal someone setting a U.S. flag on fire. Yet
the scene was taking place not in Mexico but in downtown Los
Angeles. The issue was Proposition
187, and a nation-within-the-nation was not just protesting,
but declaring its independence. "I think this is just the
opening salvo," California State University Chicano Studies
Professor Randolfo Acuna said of the protests. "It is our
Fort Sumter."

Proposition 187 has now begun its slow legal journey to the
U.S. Supreme Court, but the scars resulting from the outbursts
against it remain fresh in Californians' minds. It is clear that,
while the majority of Latinos (the part of the Hispanic community
that supported Proposition 187 overwhelmingly as late as mid-September,
before being barraged with inflammatory appeals about "racism")
continue to assimilate at a healthy rate, they do so against
the best efforts of the professional Hispanic leaders and "immigrant
rights" groups. And while it seems that these organizations
are merely opportunistic, recruiting from among the masses of
illegals pouring into California, their current efforts to create
a Hispanic "nation" in the midst of the United States
are actually the result of a longer-range process, a process
begun nearly 30 years ago by their chief patron and brain trust,
the Ford Foundation.

The demonstrations of "ethnic pride" that marked
Proposition 187 may have been a surprise to some, but for the
Ford Foundation it represented the culmination of a quarter century
of "Hispanic community-building." It was the fruition,
however unintended, of Ford's manipulation of education, immigration,
and government policies to create a new identity in America:"that
of the Hispanic."

During the past two decades, the Ford Foundation has concentrated
on programs for the expansion of Hispanic political mobilization,
litigation to "clarify the rights" of immigrants, and
research on immigration and reform legislation.

As William Hawkins describes in Importing Revolution: Open
Borders and the Radical Agenda, Ford's "bankrolling of 'open
border' advocacy policy is sharply one-sided, and often extremist...
playing the leading role in founding, and building, what are
now the major Hispanic-based organizations. "Other observers
agree that Ford's efforts have wedded questions of ethnic identity
with immigration policy. While Hispanic
separatism may seem "just a pipe-dream of...a few pot-bellied
radicals," according to Professor David Hayes-Bautista,
director of the UCLA Study of Latino Health, it is the reality
in many pockets across the Southwest. Often concentrated on college
and high

This video
goes into the Ford Foundation and explains their involvement
in organizations such as the NCLR and MALDEF.

school campuses in chapters of MEChA
(Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan) and chicano
studies, it is driven by affirmative-action and minority set-aside
programs usually coordinated by the self- defined "Hispanic"
organizations. While some in the Latino community opposed 187
because they were genuinely concerned about its provisions, the
radicals--along with the program officers at Ford who have been
pumping money into their cause for a generation --could not help
but look on the anti-187 marches like proud parents watching
a youthful movement flex its muscles.

The problems of immigration and border control between the
United States and Mexico date back to the Mexican-American War
and have worsened as the economic gap has grown to become the
largest of any two neighboring countries. The modern era of U.S.-Mexican
border relations began during World War II. The Bracero Guest
Worker Program sought to take advantage of the economic disparity
between the United States and Mexico by attracting Mexican workers
to overcome a shortage of agricultural and manual laborers. Congress
and the Mexican government authorized a program that allowed
Mexican workers into the United States for a period of up to
six months. While agricultural growers came to depend on the
near limitless supply of seasonal workers, for strike breaking
as well as picking, the program also introduced more than four
million Mexicans to the United States, which became, through
tales carried back home, the promised land.

Although the Bracero Program was officially ended in 1964,
Congress could do nothing to diminish agribusiness' demand for
cheap labor or the Mexicans' reliance on the dollar. The Immigration
Reform Act of 1965 replaced the national-origin quota system,
in place since 1920, with a system based on family reunification
and "more equitable" division of entry visas between
the Eastern and Western hemispheres. (Also included was the "Texas
proviso," which allowed employers to hire illegal aliens
without penalty.)

Caught in the backdraft of the civil rights movement, immigration
reform, which has traditionally been seen as an issue of national
sovereignty, was transformed into an issue of ethnicity and minority
rights. Mexican immigration, however, remained for the most part
economically driven until the Ford Foundation entered the field.

Henry Santiestevan, former head of the Southwest Council of
La Raza, has written:"It can be said that without the Ford
Foundation's commitment to a strategy of national and local institution-building,
the Chicano movement would have withered away in many areas."
Ford deliberately set out to politically empower Hispanics through
a series of concentrated grants, with much of the emphasis in
rural areas of the Southwest--places like New Mexico, where Reies
Tijerina attempted to build a radical chicano movement akin to
the Black Panthers in the mid-60's. Ford also looked to the urban
areas of Southern California, where illegal immigration was increasing
but was, as yet, still a sleeping issue. It would be in this
venue that Ford's investment in community organizing among Latinos
would have its most dramatic effect, cementing the relationship
between immigration and identity.

It is an irony, given the increasing tension between black
and Hispanic groups in Southern California, that Ford originally
approached the question of Hispanic rights with the intention
of strengthening its ongoing efforts on behalf of blacks. According
to the writings of Siobhan Oppenheimer-Nicolau, a former Ford
program officer, officials at Ford determined in 1966 "that
the problems of Blacks and other disadvantaged groups would not
receive sustained attention unless the political base for the
disadvantaged was broadened." Two years later Ford would
create the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund,
the most influential Hispanic group in the country--and Ford's
largest Hispanic policy recipient.

Modeled after the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, MALDEF, with an
initial $2.2-million grant, was formed with the mandate "to
assist Hispanics (legal or otherwise) in using legal means to
secure their rights." A second grant
was made to establish the National Council of La Raza "to
coordinate efforts to achieve civil rights and equal opportunity"
through support of Community Development Corporations. Under
the guidance of newly installed McGeorge Bundy, the Ford Foundation,
in addition to creating MALDEF and La Raza, funded numerous other
Hispanic advocacy groups, such as the Southwest Voter Registration
Education Project and the Latino Institute. In 1974, Ford
would establish the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education
Fund to mimic MALDEF's efforts among Puerto Ricans.

Over the next three decades Ford and other liberal institutions,
such as the Rockefeller and Carnegie Foundations, would seek
to expand the rights of Hispanics in a variety of ways. One report
by the Latino Institute found that in 1977-78, "the Ford
Foundation, provided over half (54 percent) of the support for
Hispanic needs and concerns. The Ford grants were nine times
greater in value than the foundation providing the next highest
amount." The survey also revealed that MALDEF alone received
almost one-third of all funds given to Hispanic-controlled organizations.
To date, Ford has given more than $18.9 million to MALDEF, and
$12.9 million to the National Council of La Raza.

Coming along at a time when revisionist historians were finding
a malicious recipe to the melting pot, MALDEF was guided from
the onset by the principle that its job was to strengthen the
"ethnic identity" of newly arrived immigrants, legal
and illegal, rather than aid their assimilation into their American
mainstream. Building on the first federal bilingual education
program in 1968, MALDEF won its first major victory on behalf
of Hispanics in Serna v. Portales (1972), a case that won Spanish-speaking
children in New Mexico the right to bilingual education.

MALDEF's efforts on behalf of bilingualism continued with
its support for the 1974 Supreme Court case, Lau v. Nichols,
which forced school districts to remove language barriers that
prohibited linguistic minorities from fully participating in
public education. Working with the Court's definition of "linguistic
minorities," MALDEF and other Hispanic groups took the final
steps to institutionalize an "Hispanic" identity (as
opposed to an assimilated Mexican-American one) and to gain recognition
for Hispanics as a federally recognized minority by amending
the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

At the time of the Voting Rights Act's renewal in 1975, three
Hispanics had already been elected to the House of Representatives,
one to the U.S. Senate, two were then serving as governors, and,
according to one study of Texas, 700 of them had held local office
since 1971. MALDEF maintained, however, that Mexican- Americans
had been systematically excluded from political involvement.
The organization managed to convince Congress that English-language
ballots were the same as literacy tests, which had been used
to exclude qualified blacks from voting in the South. MALDEF-sponsored
amendments to the Voting Rights Act authorized multilingual ballots
on demand whenever "language minorities" made up 5
percent of a given jurisdiction's residents (legal or otherwise)
where there had been less than 50 percent voter turnout in the
last presidential election. Thus 375 new jurisdictions were added,
mainly in the Southwest, and a new class of bilingual ballots
were created for "language minorities," including Spanish-speaking
persons, Asians, American Indians, and Alaskan Natives.

The most important effect of the 1975 VRA amendments did not
occur until 1980, when the term "Hispanic" was officially
added to the national census as an ethnicity. Facing criticism
from demographers and assimilationists in 1978, MALDEF's Vilma
Martinez, chairman of a Special Census Advisory Committee on
the Spanish Population, defended the addition:"We are trying
to get our just share of political influence and federal funds.
There's nothing sinister about it."

The 1980 census would count "Hispanics" (undocumented
along with legal residents) for the first time. For the 1990
census, MALDEF conducted a nationwide "Make Yourself Count!"
outreach program, because "everything from allocation of
Federal funds to political representation is determined by census
number," said Antonia Hernandez, MALDEF's current president
and general counsel. Having been given a new identity and having
had their numbers counted, Hispanic activists were now in a position
to take the next step--demand federal affirmative-action programs,
political redistricting, and preferential academic admissions
based on "proportionality."

As a result of Ford Foundation money and direction, Hispanic
activists had achieved the miraculous: status as a federal minority
that previously hadn't existed. MALDEF leader Vilma Martinez
defended the development, telling the New York Times that "Spanish
people most shared the 'common realities'
of poverty, poor education, unemployment, and political weakness."
Today, however, Hispanic leaders are more honest in their assessment.
As Charles Kamasaki, Vice President of National Council of La
Raza, says, "Yes, at some level the term 'Hispanic' is a
false term, [but] so is 'Asian-American'... and 'African-American.'''
Linda Chavez is more forthright, "Nobody really identifies
themselves as either 'Hispanic' or 'Latino,'" she says bluntly.

In fact, "Hispanic" is still something of a fantasy.
The 1992 Latino National Political Survey revealed that the majority
of Hispanics actually identify themselves by national origin,
i.e. Mexican, Cuban, etc. This survey also revealed that among
non-citizen Latinos, only 35 percent believed there was discrimination
against them in the United States. Ironically, the survey was
funded in part by the Ford Foundation.

Given the obvious link established between the population
count of Hispanics and their political power, the actions taken
by many of Ford's grantees on immigration reform were not unexpected.
"It was clear that political power and government support
was the preferred agenda for Ford's disciples," writes William
Hawkins in "Importing Revolution." Originally dedicated
to three principle areas on concern-- education, employment,
and voting--the MALDEF Board adopted immigration as a fourth
major program area in April 1977. As Vilma Martinez said, "Our
definition of Mexican-American had expanded to encompass not
only the citizen, but also the permanent resident alien, and
the undocumented alien." In effect, MALDEF and NCLR, according
to Chavez, sought to "erase the distinction between aliens
and citizens, legal and illegal, and to pretend the border doesn't
exist."

MALDEF had actually begun its efforts on behalf of illegal
aliens two years earlier, in 1975, as part of a joint suit with
the American Civil Liberties Union, charging the Immigration
and Naturalization Service with "indiscriminate and unconstitutional
arrests and deportations of persons of Latin or La Raza appearance."
MALDEF justified its actions on the belief that Hispanics appear
the same whether in the U.S. legally or illegally. Therefore
any efforts aimed at illegals would affect all Hispanics.

Heading up the litigation team on this case was Ramona Ripston,
head of the Southern California ACLU and a member of the National
Lawyers Guild. This extreme left-wing group resolved in 1978
to "support the movement for full democratic rights for
all non-citizens and an end to all deportations and manipulations
of the borders carried out in the interests of capitalism."
The Lawyer's Guild in 1972 had established a National Immigration
Project to "protect, defend, and extend the rights of documented
and undocumented immigrants in the United States." From
this the NLG would play a significant role in the Sanctuary movement
of the late `70s and `80s aimed at undermining U.S. foreign policy
in Central America by aiding and even smuggling illegal aliens
into the country.

Beginning in 1985, the Lawyer's Guild began to receive the
first of its $416,000 in Ford Foundation grants for "refugee
and migrant rights." Members of the organization would play
a prominent role in MALDEF's first litigation specifically on
behalf of illegal aliens, Plyler v. Doe (1982). Argued by the
Guild's Peter Schey before the U.S. Supreme Court, the case resulted
in a 5-4 decision that states could not deny illegal immigrant
children access in public education. (It would be this decision
that would lead opponents of Proposition 187 to contend that
it was unconstitutional.) Continuing its efforts to expand education
rights for illegal aliens, MALDEF won the right in Leticia A.
v. Board of Regents (1985) for illegal alien children to establish
California residency so they might pay the lower in-state tuition
in the state's university system. According to their 1993 annual
report, MALDEF is currently working to "retain [these] hard-won
educational opportunities for Latino students."

MALDEF's efforts on behalf of illegal aliens were not limited
to education. In other litigation, they prevented Los Angeles
County from forcing illegals to apply for Medi-Cal to receive
non-emergency health services, because, for this to happen, they
would have to be referred to the INS. As Peter Tijerina, MALDEF's
founder, told Vista magazine,"Hell, the remedies weren't
in the streets, they were in the courts." And the money
to pay for it all was in the Ford Foundation's bank account.
According to funding requests, MALDEF sought $600,000 from Ford
in 1985 and 1986 for support of their Immigrants' Civil Rights
Program and Political Access Program. For these two years, MALDEF
requested $2.8 million; they received 92 percent of that amount.
According to Ira Mehlman, media director of the Federation for
American Immigration Reform,"The root of all of this is
the Ford Foundation..."

To compliment efforts by MALDEF and the ACLU, the Ford Foundation
launched a new program in 1982 on behalf of refugees and immigrants
aimed at strengthening public and private agencies that assist
them, clarifying their rights and responsibilities under domestic
and international law. Between 1982-88, Ford would commit more
than $25 million to these efforts. Following passage of the 1986
Immigration Reform and Control Act, MALDEF, La Raza, and other
Hispanic groups split a $200,000 Ford grant to promote amnesty
applications among illegals.

"I think Franklin Thomas [president of the Ford Foundation
from 1979] was interested in the expansion of rights: immigrant
rights, women's rights..." says William Diaz, former Ford
programming officer in charge of Hispanic groups. "His concern
for Hispanics was also a major part of his administration."
By the early 1990's this concern had resulted in federal recognition
of Hispanics as a distinct ethnic minority deserving of affirmative-action,
government set-asides, multilingual ballots, and bilingual education.
The broader and socially more divisive achievement, however,
was to call into question the immigrant's traditional attitude
about its' relationship to America. As Linda Chavez notes in
Out of the Barrio, "Until quite recently, there was no question
but that each group desired admittance to the mainstream. No
more. Now ethnic leaders demand that their groups remain separate,
that their native culture and language be preserved intact, and
that whatever accommodation takes place be on the part of the
receiving society."

This tale is not yet complete. An interesting footnote occurred
last month in a preliminary hearing on Proposition 187 that took
place in Los Angeles. At issue was implementation of the initiative's
provisions to prohibit alien school enrollment, to eliminate
free access to non-emergency medical services and in-state tuition
rates for college-bound illegal aliens, and to facilitate the
reporting of illegal aliens to the INS. All of these developments
were the result of MALDEF's expansion of Hispanic rights over
the last 20 years. Arguing the case to suspend the voters' will
and defend Ford's and MALDEF's legacy was Peter Schey of the
National Lawyer's Guild.

Craig L. Hymowitz is a staff writer with the Investigative
Journalism Project of the Center for the Study of Popular Culture.

More on
the Ford Foundation and MALDEF, the NCLR, etc.

Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser -- June 2, 2012SPLC and other radicals target Alabama's anti-illegal immigration lawLabor and civil rights groups plan to launch campaigns aimed at discouraging tourism in Alabama and telling Hyundai customers that the company did not oppose implementation of recent changes to the state's immigration law, known as HB 658. -- Representatives of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the United Auto Workers and the Southern Poverty Law Center said on a conference call Thursday...

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The Radio Equalizer -- April 11, 2012La Raza Leader: Blacks, Hispanics should team up 'to attack common enemies'Just in case tensions weren't high enough in the Trayvon Martin case, the head of a controversial Hispanic group appears happy to pour gasoline on the fire. -- Calling for an African-American-Hispanic alliance against "common enemies," La Raza President Janet Murguia used Wednesday's Al Sharpton radio show to spread an incendiary message of hate. Happy to conveniently overlook George Zimmerman's Peruvian ancestry...

Fox News -- March 30, 2012 Latino silence over Zimmerman draws fire...Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh tore into the National Council of La Raza on Tuesday, criticizing the group's president, Janet Murguia, for omitting Zimmerman's ethnicity from her commentary on the incident. -- A caller had prompted the conversation wondering why the community hasn't stood behind Zimmerman "seeing as how he is the victim, how he was assaulted."

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Ms. Magazine -- January 10, 2012La Raza stooge movin' on up in the White HousePresident Obama announced today that he will appoint Cecilia Munoz to serve as the Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council. The position was formerly held by Melody Barnes. -- Munoz has served as the Director of Intergovernmental Affairs at the White House since January 2009. Prior to that... [Related item] [WH Press Release]

KSAZ-TV -- Phoenix -- January 5, 2012Opponents of Arizona law seek class-action statusA judge set an April 9 hearing for considering a request by opponents of Arizona's 2010 immigration enforcement law to grant class-action status in their lawsuit that seeks to declare the law unconstitutional. -- The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and other opponents are asking U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton to grant class-action status for people whose immigration status was questioned...

Hispanically Speaking -- December 21, 2011 Subversive group sues Indiana over immigration lawMALDEF has filed suit on behalf of La Union Benefica Mexicana, a Latino community and civic organization in Northern Indiana, against the State of Indiana to strike down two previously-unchallenged provisions of the State's anti-[illegal immigration] law known as Senate Bill 590 (SB 590). -- Signed into law on May 10, 2011, SB 590 creates a state-based regime of immigration regulations that poses severe and immediate threats...

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Associated Press -- September 11, 2011 Ethnic hustlers call off ridiculous Arizona boycottOne of the nation's most prominent Hispanic groups is calling off a boycott of Arizona it imposed in May 2010 over the enactment of a controversial immigration law. -- The National Council of La Raza says it's canceling the boycott because it successfully discouraged other states from enacting similar laws. -- The Washington-based group says it and two associated groups will ask other organizations to suspend...

Miguel Perez -- The Examiner -- September 1, 2011 Latino group claims Aztlán war in next five yearsPhoenix-based Nuestros Reconquistos claims that there will be a war very similar to the Civil War fought in the next five years. "La Raza and MEChA have already talked to Latinos and Phoenix and explained that Latinos need to arm themselves for war," says Nuestros Reconquistos President Manuel Longoria. -- Cecilia Maldonado of Chicanos Unidos Arizona isn't hoping for any sort of war, but...

Contra Costa Times -- Walnut Creek, Calif. -- August 25, 2011 Berkeley chancellor seeking funds for illegalsUC Berkeley is asking some of the country's largest foundations to help [illegal aliens] afford college. -- Buoyed by a new state law that allows public colleges and universities to offer private scholarships to students who came to the United States illegally, UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau said Wednesday he has spoken to major organizations such as the Carnegie and Ford Foundations...

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Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Editorial -- July 28, 2011 The La Raza speech: Pandering to radicalsPresident Barack Obama abandons U.S. border state interests, not to mention federal immigration laws, by stepping before the National Council of La Raza and pledging, "The Democrats and your president are with you." -- That's akin to saying immigration "reform" under his administration will be an open-door policy for illegal aliens. Especially with regard to this group...

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Associated Press -- July 25, 2011 Obama renews pledge on illegal alien amnestyPresident Barack Obama called on Hispanic activists Monday to build a movement outside Washington to push for overhauling immigration, saying he can't do it by himself and Republicans aren't playing along. -- He said he remains committed to his unfulfilled promise to rewrite the nation's immigration laws to offer a pathway to citizenship for 11 million [illegal aliens]...

Dave Gibson -- The Examiner -- July 25, 2011 Obama tells La Raza that Democrats are with them on amnestyOn Monday, President Obama addressed the National Council of La Raza and once again told the Latino crowd that our immigration system is broken and a political solution is necessary to amend the situation (i.e. amnesty for illegal aliens). -- Obama said: "The idea of doing things on my own is very tempting, I promise you, not just on immigration reform [aka amnesty]..."

White House via Gretawire.com -- July 25, 2011 Obama's remarks at La Raza soiree today..Right off the bat, I should thank you [La Raza] because I [Obama] have poached quite a few of your alumni to work in my administration. They're all doing outstanding work. Raul Yzaguirre, my ambassador to the Dominican Republic -- Latinos serving at every level of my administration. We've got young people right out of college in the White House. We've got the first Latina Cabinet Secretary in history, Hilda Solis...

NPR -- July 25, 2011 Audio Report IncludedObama steps up effort to pander to Hispanics, againVirtually any time President Obama has opened his mouth in public this month, it has been to talk about the debt ceiling. On Monday, he shifts his focus -- at least for an hour -- to address the National Council of La Raza, the largest Hispanic [ethnic-hustling] group in the country. It's the latest effort in the president's intense campaign to win the hearts and minds of Latinos...

Jim Kouri, CPP -- The Examiner -- July 13, 2011 HUD continues funding of ACORN, probe revealsWhile President Barack Obama threatens the elderly with interruption of receiving Social Security checks in August due to the debt ceiling issue, his administration is giving taxpayer's money to groups such as the corrupt ACORN and racist La Raza...

Judicial Watch -- Corruption Chronicles -- June 29, 2011 NCLR funding skyrockets after Obama hires its VPA Judicial Watch investigation reveals that federal funding for a Mexican La Raza group that for years has raked in millions of taxpayer dollars has skyrocketed since one of its top officials got a job in the Obama White House. -- The influential and politically-connected National Council of La Raza has long benefitted from Uncle Sam's largess but the group has made a killing since Obama hired its senior vice president (Cecilia Muñoz) in 2009...

Mike Piccione -- Human Events -- March 17, 2011 Outrage! Feckless Feds funding La Raza with your tax dollarsThe United States government is funding the National Council of La Raza with our tax dollars. La Raza, which literally means in Spanish "The Race," is a radical organization that advocates open borders and amnesty for illegal aliens. I pulled and analyzed the tax return Form 990, the form filed by 501(c) 3 organizations to the IRS, and here is what was reported...